Law & Order/Season 13

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Law & Order (1990–2010, 2022-) is a long-running police procedural and courtroom drama television series, created by Dick Wolf.

American Jihad [13.01]

McCoy: [about Branch] Nice fella.

Serena: And his politics?

McCoy: [pause] Nice fella.

Green: [after Phil repeatedly calls him a primate] I want to ask your opinion on Einstein's theory because I'm not sure he was right.

Phil: Headline: 'Cop Cracks Relativity'.

Green: No, not that theory, Phil. His theory on genius. See, and correct me if I'm wrong, Einstein argued that genius has no personality. But after talking to you for this short amount of time, I realize that you actually prove the negative. You definitely have personality. And it makes this primate want to whoop your ass. Now say somethin'.

Briscoe: [grinning] Way to go Ed!

Shangri-La [13.02]

McCoy: Never get Freudian with a man holding a pickle.

Serena: I thought you said no jury would convict Little Orphan Annie.

McCoy: I did. Lizzie Borden is a different matter.

True Crime [13.03]

Branch: Since when does freedom of speech apply only to the nattering nabobs of negativism?

Serena: The victim was Patty Voytek. She's some big rock star...

Branch: I have a 16-year-old granddaughter; I know exactly who she is.

Tragedy on Rye [13.04]

Branch: You know, this whole affair makes you think twice.

McCoy: About the death penalty?

Branch: About where to buy you a steak.

The Ring [13.05]

Hagen: C'mon, guys. It's not like I'm the first man on the planet to step out on his wife.

Green: You ain't the first man whose mistress ended up dead, either.

Serena: People ask that the suspect be remanded without bail, Your Honor.

Judge Goldberg: What are we having today, a special on chutzpah? Bail is set at $500,000. Do you have that on you, Mr. Hagen, or do you need a few minutes?

Branch: The Hagen women stand by their men. It's part of their vows: "I promise to love, honor, respect and obey, and let you run around with as many women as you want."

McCoy: Even if he kills them.

Branch: They're not that picky.

Hitman [13.06]

Green: Took one in the back of the head. Close range, small caliber. No exit wound, no brass. Very tidy. Very professional.

Briscoe: Yeah, what do you bet there's no prints, either?

Green: Well, we'd better find Mrs. Rosatti, tell her her husband's dead.

Briscoe: If she doesn't already know.

Green: Man, you are such a cynic when it comes to love.

Briscoe: Not love. Marriage.

David: Do either of you speak French?

Green: A little.

David: Good, then you'll understand what I mean when I say my father was a schmuck.

Open Season [13.07]

Melnick: Hello, Jack. Okay, let's talk turkey. What are you up to? And don't give me that party line about Preuss being a threat to society.

McCoy: When you argue, I have this compulsive need to argue back.

[the detectives want Serena to deal with a gang of white supremacists]

Serena: What, you think they'll talk to me?

Green: Blonde hair, blue eyes...Hell, if you're lucky, they'll put you in a poster.

Serena: [sarcastically] Gee, thanks.

Briscoe: [after McCoy arrives at the scene of Melnick's shooting] Better be careful, Jack. Looks like it's open season on lawyers.

Asterisk [13.08]

Lt. Van Buren: What is it with the male of the species?

Briscoe: Got a couple of months?

Lt. Van Buren: I'm referring to the way you can just about melt in front of a guy who can hit a ball with a bat.

Green: All I said was that if the kid stays healthy, he's a lock for Cooperstown.

Lt. Van Buren: Yeah, only it was how you said it.

Green: How'd I say it?

Lt. Van Buren: Like a 6-year-old talking about a banana split.

McCoy: This has to be a first: a lawyer's negligence benefiting his case.

The Wheel [13.09]

Briscoe: My ex-wife talked me into seeing a counselor, and the counselor talked me into getting a divorce.

Serena: [about the Falun Gong protestors] You should have seen them, Jack. Talk about weird. They were just frozen there like statues.

McCoy: In this country, weird's allowed.

Mother's Day [13.10]

Lt. Van Buren: You're only as happy as your unhappiest kid.

McCoy: Feeling good, are we?

Serena: It really makes my day when a mother kills her son for no reason whatsoever.

McCoy: Call Hallmark. Maybe they'll print up a special card.

Chosen [13.11]

McCoy: I'm willing to go down to Man Two.

Randolph J. Dworkin: Now, don't think I'm not an appreciative sort, but I'm going to have to say no on this one. As it turns out, there are considerations beyond innocence and guilt.

McCoy: Like a stacked jury?

Randolph J. Dworkin: Yeah, that's right. Those people. They all stick together. It's kind of like back in the day, when Billy Bob was on trial for lynching poor Willie for looking at Betty Lou the wrong way, and the jury was Goomer and Gomer and Beau.

Serena: It is hardly the same thing.

Randolph J. Dworkin: Why, because we're the chosen people? [affects a Southern accent] Well, if that's the case, I wish y'all would choose someone else for a change.

McCoy: Mr. Dworkin is a first-rate attorney. Hell, he's a magician. He put the facts into a box, sawed the box in half, and out popped thousands of years of the most despicable hatred known to man. Like any good magician, he kept you busy with what he was saying, hoping you wouldn't notice what he was doing with his hands. Hoping you wouldn't catch him trying to hide a corpse, trying to make a murdered man disappear. I'm betting you saw through the trick. So the only question is, will you pretend it worked, or will you make this illusion disappear? One bookie killed another bookie. That's it. Period. The defense hardly bothers to say otherwise. Mr. Dworkin just now all but said his client killed Mr. Meeks. Not once did he claim Mr. Strelzik was innocent. Like I say, he's a good attorney. He knows no one would believe him. Instead, he had the deeply offensive idea to use your sympathy for Israel to put a killer back on the street. Mr. Dworkin wants you to choose culture over citizenship. Visceral hatred over codified laws. He's counting on at least one of you saying to himself, "I'm a Jew first, and only after that, an American." I asked you back when you were selected for this job whether you could look at the facts presented without passion or prejudice, and each one of you swore under oath that you could. I know it's hard, but if you don't, all of this is meaningless.

Randolph J. Dworkin: [joining Jack and Serena for dinner after Strelzik is convicted] Hell of a job. You're top of the legal food chain, Jack. No question about it.

Serena: You're not upset?

Randolph J. Dworkin: Hey, giving money to Israel is a good thing. Everyone should do it. Murder, on the other hand? [raises his glass] Here's to hoping the Big Guy upstairs has a little more sympathy for Mr. Strelzik than did the People of the State of New York.

Under God [13.12]

[Briscoe tries to get a murder suspect to confess by talking about his own murdered daughter]

Briscoe: She was 24. A guy like Giddens killed her.

Parker: He go to jail?

Briscoe: Yeah. Thing is, I get up every morning, I shave, I brush my teeth, and I kick myself for not putting a .38 slug between his eyes. Maybe then...

Parker: Do not say closure. No such thing. This is great. My kid dies, and no one lifts a finger. Someone kills this creep, here you are with a thousand questions.

Briscoe: Not a thousand, Bill. Just one.

Branch: Justification?

Serena: "Yes, I killed, but God told me to."

Branch: You gotta admit, it's a lot more creative than "the Devil made me do it".

McCoy: Next stop, virgin sacrifices.

McCoy: Smile, Serena. This is our Inherit the Wind. This is where we get to prove in a court of law that there is no big guy up there with the white beard pulling invisible strings.

Serena: So what exactly did those nuns do to you?

Absentia [13.13]

Mrs. Trevanza: Get the hell out!

Briscoe: [to Green] Don't you just love innocent bystanders?

Briscoe: Will's what you call "old-fashioned".

Green: You mean prehistoric.

Briscoe: And yet he's entertaining, in a Neanderthal sort of way.

Star Crossed [13.14]

McCoy: Last I heard, stupid is not a defense to murder.

Connors: [after being caught suborning perjury] Thirty years I've been at this. Thirty years trying to knock six months to a year off the sentence of some piece of dirt who, when all is said and done, is gonna rot in Hell anyway. That's some way to measure your life, isn't it? Counting the time that murderers aren't in prison. I have measured out my life in coffee spoons. Couple bucks here and there. A week in Miami Beach twice a year. What about you, Jack? Who are you?

McCoy: I do what my job requires.

Connors: That's not enough for me. For once in my sorry life, I dared to eat the peach.

Bitch [13.15]

Clerk: Docket #423763. People vs. Jacqueline Scott. Charge is murder in the first degree.

Judge Goldberg: That's as good as it gets. What's your plea?

Scott: Not guilty, your honor.

Brolin: My client is a valued member of the community. She employs thousands of New Yorkers who depend on her for their salary.

Judge Goldberg: Does she have a cat? I like cats.

Serena: The state asks for remand without bail. Miss Scott's wealth makes her a flight risk.

Brolin: Since when is financial success a criminal offense?

Judge Goldberg: So, let's say we make her that much less offensive. Bail is set at 2,000,000 cash.

Serena: Your honor, this defendant could hop on a private plane as easily as you and I could get on the subway.

Judge Goldberg: But can she get a cab in the rain? I'll take your passport, too, Miss Scott.

Serena: For added assurance, the People also request an electronic ankle bracelet and house arrest.

Judge Goldberg: Don't fret, Miss Scott. Maybe you can cook up some matching accessories. [bangs gavel] Next.

Scott: Do you have any idea how much I pay in city taxes?

Briscoe: I do; I want to thank you for these new shoes.

Suicide Box [13.16]

Stevie: So what, you get some kind of raise for every brother you bring in?

Green: That's right man, for every 10 I bring in I get an extra day's pay. If he's got a big mouth, I get 2 days. If I bring him in a little bloody, The Man gives me a damn toaster oven!

Cushman: Tell him there's no one out there gunning for me.

Briscoe: Well, we can't confirm or deny.

Cushman: Yeah, right. All those parking tickets, I knew I should have worn a Kevlar bra.

Genius [13.17]

[Green stayed up all night with an alcoholic to get a lead in a murder case]

Lt. Van Buren: 5 hours? I hope to hell he called you in the morning.

Green: Hey, the best way to get a drunk to open his mouth is to let him drink, isn't that right, Lennie?

Briscoe: Hear, hear!

Serena: Not that it matters, but does he feel any kind of remorse at all?

Dr. Skoda: No. Clay Warner couldn't care less about anyone.

McCoy: I can't think of a better candidate for execution.

Maritime [13.18]

Policeman: [examining the victim] Gunshot wound. We need to order an autopsy to determine whether it was self-inflicted.

Briscoe: You think she shot herself before or after she jumped?

McCoy: 4 people got on the boat, one got off. The math's not difficult.

Sean: I don't like boats. They dropped me off in Greenport. Darrell and everybody were fine.

Serena: Yeah, there is that pirate problem.

Seer [13.19]

Lt. Van Buren: You make one hell of a bad cop!

Briscoe: Practice, practice, practice. I give him about 10 minutes with Ed before he starts to sing.

Lt. Van Buren: Our luck, he sings as bad as he lies.

McCoy: [at a self-proclaimed psychic's trial] So, how will this trial turn out?

Defense attorney: Objection!

Judge: Very funny, Mr. McCoy. Please don't do that again.

McCoy: Masters might not be as crazy as he looks. Last year, 50 million people paid 50 bucks to watch 6 psychics talk to George Washington on pay-per-view.

Branch: What's the point? I hear the old boy wasn't such a great interview when he was alive.

Kid Pro Quo [13.20]

Briscoe: Were you home all evening, Mr Scofield?

Scofield: Except for my constitutional, which I take every evening religiously at 8 o'clock.

Green: Your "constitutional"?

Briscoe: You should watch more Masterpiece Theatre, Ed.

McCoy: Scofield has been standing over the oven for twenty-five years. He thought it was about time he got a taste of the pie.

Serena: Now Scofield's out and Anchin's in. That's going to be a hard pill for the parents of the Knowles School to swallow.

Branch: Oh, they'll get over it, once they forget about where his money came from.

McCoy: It's the American way: yesterday's robber baron is tomorrow's philanthropist.

Serena: What you're really trying to say is cash trumps merit every time.

Branch: And twice on Sundays!

House Calls [13.21]

Briscoe: You know, Ed, I've heard about this, but I never thought it could actually happen.

Green: What?

Briscoe: She shopped 'til she dropped.

Briscoe: Full-contact modeling. Now there's a Pay-Per-View special I'd ante up for.

Sheltered [13.22]

Green: What'd you find out?

Briscoe: Could have been a stray bullet.

Green: 6 inches to the right, she'd still be here.

Briscoe: 6 inches to the right and Lincoln would have seen the end of the play.

McCoy: There's always a chance Justin could be rehabilitated, Arthur.

Branch: 4 dead? I don't think he's earned that chance. And I also think my senior prosecutor should agree with it.

McCoy: I do.

Serena: But...?

McCoy: I'm a father.

Couples [13.23]

Clerk: Docket #534687. People vs. Reynaldo Celaya. Murder in the first degree.

Judge Goldberg: And the plea?

Reynaldo: Not guilty, your honor.

Judge Goldberg: There's a first. Miss Southerlyn?

Southerlyn: The defendant shot and killed his brother's wife within days of being released from prison. Bail shouldn't even be a consideration.

Judge Goldberg: I don't suppose you agree with that.

Clemens: Bail schmail. What's a couple of days in Rikers after 10 years in Attica? Not gonna waste your time, your honor.

Judge Goldberg: You know what, counselor? This is a first.

[just as Reynaldo is escorted out, Rafael jumps out of his seat and confronts his brother]

Rafael: ¡Tu eres un demonio! ¡Asesino!

Reynaldo: ¡Era mi esposa!

Rafael: [shouts back in Spanish]

Reynaldo: Not if I kill you first!!

Rafael: ¡Yo te mato! ¡Yo te mato! ¡Es mi esposa!

Reynaldo: She's my wife! Cabron, she's my wife!

Rafael: ¡¡ASESINO!! [shouts in Spanish] ¡Reynaldo, yo te mato! ¡Asesino! ¡ASESINO!

[both brothers are separately escorted out of the courtroom]

Judge Goldberg: Hmm. Nothing like a little excitement to get the heart pumping. What's next on the menu?

Clerk: Docket #534781. People vs. Clara Perazzo. Charge is murder in the second degree.

Judge Goldberg: Surprise me, Miss Perazzo.

Clara: I don't know what you mean.

Judge Goldberg: I need a plea. Did you do it?

Clara: Yes!

Berman: I don't think my client understands, your honor.

Clara: I understand perfectly. I killed the SOB.

Berman: She's obviously mentally disturbed.

Southerlyn: The defendant killed her husband, your honor.

Berman: She ran him over 4 times with her car.

Judge Goldberg: I admire her restraint.

Berman: I object!

Judge Goldberg: Cool your jets, counselor. Shall we take this from the top?

Clara: No need to, your honor. Dom is dead, and I did it. I knew exactly what I was doing.

Judge Goldberg: I'm not supposed to express personal opinions in the courtroom, but I gotta tell you, Miss Perazzo, you make me proud to be an American.

Clara: Thank you.

Judge Goldberg: Cheating on you, was he?

Clara: Yeah! But I could live with that. I could live with his perversions. But I won't go under the knife for anyone! [points at her breasts] These were good enough for him when we got married!

[Green has just taken a call after working a long, exhausting shift with Briscoe.]

Green: Damn!

Briscoe: What?

Green: We got a jumper.

Briscoe: I may join him.

Smoke [13.24]

Judge Torledsky: Bail is set at $1,000,000. And you'll be happy to know, Mr. Bender, that ten of those dollars are mine. More, if you get a piece of the popcorn.

Green: People get around stars, they get stupid.

Briscoe: Waiting in line to see Madonna is stupid. This is a felony.